


till there was you

by stenbrouris



Category: IT (2017), IT - Stephen King
Genre: M/M, Roaring 20s AU, and dancing, bc haha pEnynyfuck, ben works in a factory, bev is a flapper girl, bill is a broke writer, eddie is a bartender, he wants to leave New York though, he works with benny boy, mike's a tap dancer, richie is a makeup wearing dancer, stanley's a singer, the speakeasy is named The Turtle, there's alcohol
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-18
Updated: 2018-06-19
Packaged: 2019-04-03 21:44:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14005440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stenbrouris/pseuds/stenbrouris
Summary: There was love all aroundBut I never heard it singingNo, I never heard it at allTill there was you





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> feedback is rad if you'd like to leave any :)

From outside the city, Bill was sure it looked like something made of dreams.

 

Tall buildings, ones that reached up and touched the heavens, grew beyond the dreams of the people who lived there. The oh, so many people who resided there- so many different souls. So many different bodies and skeletons to fall into and out of love with. He knew how the city lit up at night. Casting shadows and colors across the city streets, across the faces of strangers you'd pass. Shining just a hint of light at the secrets that lie beneath the city, but not enough to reveal them. Just enough, just barely, to entrap you in an intrigued state. 

Yes, he knew it looked like a dream.

Almost too good to be true. 

He knew, because that's how he'd ended up there.

He'd grown up, been raised in silence, in a reclusive, hand me down town, worn from the generations that had stayed there. 

He had dreamed of something else- somewhere else- his entire life. And once he got the opportunity, he went. No hesitation, no thought of staying because that's where he had grown up and been his entire lifetime. 

Derry.

And he'd came to the New York.

Why? Why the city, out of all the places he could have gone? Out of every single option he had laid out before him, why did he pick something so different- so completely out of the ordinary?

Because it was exactly that. It was different. 

There was something so completely and utterly capturing about the city. Maybe it was the stories that got passed around, the ones filled with whispers about the famous, lush lifestyle. It could have been the way Bill could see the stories practically walking on the street. 

He had lusted for different his whole life, and then he'd gotten it.

 

And he hated it.

Bill absolutely despised the city.

 

With it's big, colorful nights and busy streets. With the thousands upon thousands of people just trying to walk, all too stuck in their own ways and lives to actually stop and realize they'd jinxed themselves into a sea of disaster. 

Only, it was too late to do anything about his situation now.

He'd rented a tired, lousy apartment in the middle of the city, one where there were holes in the walls and the doors hung crooked from the hinges. He figured he could try and fix them both at some time, but for now he'd leave it be. He'd walked from the middle of town down main, where he'd saw cigarette smoke coming out of cafe booths, and crossed over the street to a chunk of a gray building.

It was clothed in metal, and it seemed more like a military camping base than a place to work. 

They let him on with a day shift welding railroad tracks. Because of the growing and increasing popularity of wheeled automations, they were in higher demand for everything track-related.

Of course, Bill would rather be at home in his small, broken down apartment writing stories on his typewriter. But that wouldn't pay rent, and it wouldn't get him anywhere. 

He ended up meeting a fellow named, "Ben,"

 

the man said, blonde stubble lining his angled jaw, "Hanscom."

 

Bill reached out and took the man's hand, flashing a smile. He didn't think much of the gesture, and he most definitely didn't think that this man, the first friendly face he'd come into contact with, would become one of his closest friends. 

 

"Bill," Bill said, giving a little nod before bringing his hand back. "B-Bill Denb-brough."

 

Ben nodded and tucked his hands behind his suspenders, the ones hooked onto his stained work pants. Bill noticed how tired he looked, with his wide eyes, ones that he thought should have been filled with joy and a sparkle, but now only held a kind of dull glaze. The tips of his fingers and palms were calloused, and there was dirt under the man's fingernails, but Bill didn't figure he could be bothered to scrape it out. Strips of Bill's red hair fell into his eyes, and it caught him out of his thoughts. 

 

"So where'd you come from, kid?" The man asked, picking up a box.

 

Bill shrugged and followed blindly after him, ducking under moving wood and stepping over cracks in the ground. There were many, though, and he eventually gave up trying to avoid them all. 

 

"A hole in the w-wall, I guess. A clich- cliche, a real b-buzzkill," He explained, looking around the building. There were more people than Bill had thought, even though he wasn't quite sure what he'd been expecting. It was a big city, a big blot of ink thrown onto the map he'd so carefully studied before he'd shown up. But still, the amount of people walking around and working with machines in the factory amazed him. There had to be more people than the entire population of Derry. 

 

"A real cliche, huh?" Came a gruff voice, and Bill looked up to see the man looking down at him. There was an amused look on his face, and Bill suddenly felt small, a shadow casting over his eyes. 

 

"W-well, I mean-" Ben cut him off, waving a hand in front of his face. He shook his dirty, sandy-blond hair and gave a low laugh. He looked around at the people near him before leaning down to Bill's level, meeting his eyes with his own. 

 

"This whole town's a cliche, kid. The people, the beer. This factory, me, you-" Ben gave another laugh, "we just all pretend like it's everyone else, everything, anything else but us. And that's exactly what makes us as bland as we are."

 

Bill swallowed, his cheeks watering as Ben returned to his original height. 

 

"Hanscom! We're not paying you to stand around and run yer' trap! Quit yappin' and get'cha ass to work!"

 

Ben winked to Bill, just as the smile started to fade away from his cheeks. "See ya around, kid." 

Bll watched as Ben walked off, disappearing back just the way he'd came. He wondered just how much more there was to the man, with the golden ring on his finger and the hardness of his eyes. Bill turned around, deciding he should probably find an office of some sort, but was met face-to-chest with a red-faced man.

 

"You! Yer' new, ain't you?" He demanded, arms covered with thick, dark hair crossing over his chest. He was taller than Ben, Bill thought, but not as sturdy. Was that the correct word?

"Answer me, boy."

His eyes flashed up to meet the man's and stepped back a smidge, cowering from his shadow. 

"Erm- y-yes, I am, s-sir." Bill stuttered out, his face coloring from embarrassment. The man grunted and gave Bill a once-over, eventually letting his arms fall to his sides. "Follow me, then."

 

And then Bill had a job. 

It may have been one which he didn't really enjoy doing… but it would keep a roof over his head. He would always much rather be writing, his fingers fluttering across his typewriter keyboards, spitting out stories and poems and tales of everything he could imagine. Bill thought he could write forever and never run out of words to use. Bill loved to write, and he was completely infatuated with the way his words looked typed out on a page. It was empowering to him, almost the way the sound of the keys made his heart flutter.

Nothing in the city made him feel the same way.

Not the lights of the city, or the beautiful (weren't they beautiful? Bill knew his face didn't color at the sight of them, nor did he feel his chest tighten) women he passed on the street. Nothing he thought could make him feel the same way his words did. He thought he might have been a narcissist, in love with his own words and nothing but. He kept this thought with him for a while, eventually coming to terms with it. Bill Denbrough would have never thought himself a narcissist.

 

Only one night, under low-filtered, drunken lights did he realize he had been wrong. 

 

Who knew smooth jazz in the form of a blue-eyed creature could change your entire world?


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter's short but the next one is where it gets going oof

It was another dreaded day at the factory, and Bill was trudging along, barely there. He'd been welding metal sheaths to wood boards all day, and God knew, he thought, how many metal splinters he had in his thumbs already. The heat resistant hand jails- as Bill liked to call them- (they were really called heat-resistance welding gloves, but they weren't very good at keeping out heat- or metal) didn't do their job very well. He had been put in a part of the factory a semi-mild bit away from Ben, but just enough to where he could still see him. They talked on their breaks, and sometimes in between on their way back to their assigned spots. 

 

Bill thought he considered Ben a friend. His only friend, that was. Bill didn't know anyone in New York, and he didn't plan on trying too. There were too many people, too many separate lives to get tangled up in. Bill thought, since Ben had been the first actual person he'd spoke too, that there must had been a reason they'd met. Of course, it could have just been Bill being the writer he was, making wild assumptions only a madman would, but he liked to think it could just be fate.

"Bill? Hello, kid," Ben waved his free hand in front of Bill's face, his eyebrows drawn into a stern line. Bill had realized that Ben always looked very stern, undertones of years of long nights without sleep. He came back to reality, his eyes focusing in on the blur of hand in front of him before turning his eyes to Ben.

 

"S-sorry, Ben. You m-mind running that th-through one more t-time?" 

Ben gave a short, breathy laugh and patted Bill's shoulder. "Sure can, Denbrough.

 

There's this- now, hear me out- little," he checked over his shoulder before lowering his voice a level, "speakeasy. It's downtown, real underground. Been going for a while now, ain't no one found out about it yet, either. The law, I mean." He laughed and rubbed at his chin. "And my girl, Beverly."

Bill watched as Ben's eyes lit up. For the first time since Bill had known Ben Hanscom, he watched as all the hardness of the years and tiredness left his eyes and were replaced with nothing but pure adoration and something else...

"She works there. She's one of their flapper girls. She's pretty damned good too. They gave her her own segment and everything."

 

Bill nodded, watching Ben speak about her. 

He imagined what she might look like, blonde hair, probably mid-length. Feather tucked behind a diamond pin. 

 

"I go watch her every night, unless I have a shift, y'know." He stopped and watched as strangers crossed the street, street lamp posts casting a dim shadow over the buildings they stood by. "I was wondering if you wanted to go with me tonight. Go see what the city really has. Get out of that little cramped room of yours."

 

Bill colored a bit, embarrassed at the mention of his apartment. It was uncomfortable, but it was as much as he could afford. 

He thought about the offer for a moment, running his hand over his forearm. He didn't really have enough money to go out, especially if there were going to be drinks. And then, there was his work. Not his factory work, but his words. His typewriter, sitting at home, paper still halfway filled from last night's story telling. He opened his mouth, about to decline the offer, but Ben raised a hand to stop him. 

 

"Don't worry about the fare, kid. Drinks are on me. But you've gotta socialize if I take 'ya. No being reclusive and corner sitting." 

 

Bill looked down again, biting on his tongue. He shouldn't really. There were so many things that could happen, and if they got busted-

"Bill,"

 

Ben's hard hands squeezed his shoulders reassuringly. His facial expression softened as Bill looked up, and he gave him a small shake. "You said you're a writer."

 

Bill nearly died as Ben spoke those words into air. They sounded so unrealistic and childish when put into existence. He felt his cheeks warm, dropping his head. "Right?"

 

Bill didn't answer, but Ben didn't wait for one, anyways. 

 

"Just- think of it this way, kid. You can sit in that room, staring at a blank sheet of paper for hours waiting for ideas to come to you-" He dropped his right arm back to his side, placing his right hand against Bill's neck. 

"Or you can go out and be the start of those ideas. Become your own material. Your experiences, the thrill, the whole nine yards- you're a completely blank page, Denbrough-"

 

Bill looked up then, almost willing to bet his life that Ben could feel his pulse under his thumb. 

 

"Why not start living?"


End file.
